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Saturday, July 21, 2012

Independent India has been a large-scale experiment in democracy. Unlike
many other nations that gained independence from colonial rule but
descended into dictatorships and military rule, India has remained a
democracy, despite its size and diversity. While we pride ourselves on
this achievement, we also need to reflect more on the problems and
challenges that face Indian democracy. Concerns relating to scams,
criminal records of elected representatives and disorder in Parliament
recur, but a deeper question needs to be asked: how democratic,
actually, is Indian democracy?

Friday, July 20, 2012

On June 19, the Supreme Court of Pakistan barred
the country's elected chief executive, Yusuf Raza Gilani, both from
being a member of parliament and prime minister on the basis that he had
been guilty of contempt of court and had thereby brought the judiciary
into ridicule. The court's decision was subsequently subjected to severe
criticism in the international press as well as by Pakistan's liberal
intelligentsia in leading English-language publications; the court's
action was portrayed as essentially anti-democratic and "political" in
nature.
The international response to this action is understandable. Every
event with political consequences is analysed solely in the light of
likely impact on the "War on Terror" or the NATO involvement in
Afghanistan. As such, any manner of instability in Pakistan is
problematic.

FRANKFURT (MarketWatch) -- Euro-zone finance ministers on Friday
formally approved an agreement with Spain that will allow the country's
government to borrow as much as 100 billion euros ($123 billion) from
the euro zone's rescue funds to recapitalize its ailing banking sector,
news reports said. "We have formally approved the memorandum that lays
out the conditions under which Spain can be lent money for the
recapitalization of its banks," Luxembourg Finance Minister Luc Frieden
told reporters, according to Reuters. Approval was widely expected.
Spanish government bonds remained under pressure, with the 10-year yield
ES:10YR_ESP+1.58%
rising 0.09 percentage point to 7.08%, according to Tradeweb. The euro EURUSD-0.68%
was down 0.7% versus the dollar at $1.2192.

(Reuters) -
Impoverished North Korea is gearing up to experiment with agricultural
and economic reforms after young leader Kim Jong-un and his powerful
uncle purged the country's top general for opposing change, a source
with ties to both Pyongyang and Beijing said.The source added that the
cabinet had created a special bureau to take control of the decaying
economy from the military - one of the world's largest - which under
Kim's father was given pride of place in running the country.

Microsoft posted a loss of 492 million dollars on
Thursday, its first-ever quarterly loss since it became a public company
in 1986.

The loss was attributed to a massive
6.2-billion dollar charge that the company booked earlier this month as a
writedown on its 2007 purchase of online advertising firm eQuantive for
6.3 billion dollars.

For the quarter, Microsoft
booked record revenues of 18.06 billion dollars, a rise of 7 per cent
over the same period a year ago, and operating income of 6.93 billion
dollars.

In a democracy, the remedy for a malfunctioning legislature and executive must come from the people, not the judiciary

It is evident that the Pakistan Supreme Court has embarked on a perilous
path of confrontation with the political authorities, which can only
have disastrous consequences for the country. Recently its Chief Justice
said that the Constitution, not Parliament, is supreme. This is
undoubtedly settled law since the historical decision of the U.S.
Supreme Court in Marbury vs. Madison (1803).

UNITED NATIONS
(AP) -- Russia and China have again vetoed a Western-backed U.N.
resolution threatening non-military sanctions against Syria. It was
aimed at stepping up pressure on President Bashar Assad's government to
end the escalating 16-month conflict.

Thursday's
11-2 vote, with two abstentions, leaves in limbo the future of the
300-strong U.N. peacekeeping force in Syria, whose mandate expires
Friday.

Britain's U.N. Ambassador Mark Lyall
Grant, who sponsored the Western-backed draft, said he was "appalled" at
the third double veto by Russia and China, allies of the Assad regime.

Google took several images with fish-eye lenses and then stitched them together to allow users to explore Shackleton's hut

Images
of the Antarctic huts used by polar explorers Sir Ernest Shackleton and
Robert Falcon Scott have been posted online as part of the latest
extension to Google's Maps service.

The prefabricated wooden cabins were erected in 1908 and 1911
respectively, and were used as bases for the men's attempts to reach
the south pole.
Users can navigate the 360-degree photographs to see some of the kit and supplies used by both expeditions.

Police today arrested 100 workers of the Maruti Suzuki’s plant in
Manesar in connection with the yesterday’s violence in which a senior
company official was killed and 50 others were injured.

The charred body of the official, who was caught in the violence
triggered by a scuffle over suspension of an employee after a heated
exchange of words, was today identified as that of Awanish Kumar Dev,
General Manager, HR, at the plant.

In Chandigarh, Haryana Industry Minister Randeep Singh Surjewala said
that nearly 100 people had been arrested so far. “They have been
arrested for various charges including murder, attempt to murder and
destruction of property,” the minister said.

Wednesday, July 18, 2012

The Guwahati incident shows that journalists do not always adhere to
the ethical standards of behaviour that they demand of others

I remember watching “The Death of Kevin Carter: Casualty of the Bang Bang Club,”
an American documentary about the suicide of South African
photojournalist Kevin Carter, at a film festival organised by my law
school in 2010. The documentary that was nominated for the Academy
Awards depicts the gut-wrenching tale of Carter’s enduring depression by
the carnage he witnessed as a photographer in warzones.

Tuesday, July 17, 2012

It operated in many jurisdictions with weak anti-money laundering controls’

This week policymakers in the U.S. Treasury and State Department had to
suspend their sense of disbelief as they watched one of the darlings of
the US’ banking system, HSBC, slammed by the Senate for allowing
billions of dollars’ worth of transactions in money laundering and
terrorism financing that aided Mexican drug cartels, Saudi Arabian banks
with links to al-Qaeda and even Iranian institutions subject to U.S.
sanctions.

In a report released on Monday the U.S. Senate’s Committee on Homeland
Security and Governmental Affairs pulled no punches as it argued that
HSBC operated in many jurisdictions with “weak AML (Anti Money
Laundering) controls, high risk clients, and high risk financial
activities including Asia, Middle East, and Africa.”

“The primary investigation confirms that the boat was in its right
course and did not pose any danger. The shooting was clearly a mistake,”
Dahi Khalfan Tamim, Dubai’s influential police chief, was quoted as
saying by the UAE daily The National.

The U.S. Navy has said that it was forced to open fire as a last resort,
after the fishing boat failed to heed an entire protocol of warnings.

The Indian embassy in Abu Dhabi is working with local authorities to
carry out a full investigation into the incident. “We have made the
request and the UAE authorities have already begun the investigation on
their own,” said M.K. Lokesh, Indian ambassador to the UAE.

In a complete U-turn and ending a month-long suspense, Trinamool
Congress announced its decision to vote for UPA’s presidential candidate
Pranab Mukherjee ‘in the interest of coalition’

After proposing the name of A P J Abdul Kalam and two others a month ago
creating a near crisis for the UPA government last month, Trinamool
chief and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday
disclosed the party’s decision saying it had no other option and that it
was not to support any individual.

The decision of the party, the second largest constituent in the UPA
with 19 MPs in Lok Sabha and 9 in Rajya Sabha, comes apparently under
pressure from within the party to back Mr. Mukherjee, who would be the
first Bengali to become a President, and not to ignore local sentiments.

If it is right for the U.S. to stop outsourcing jobs to India, it is also right for India to stop a Walmart at the door

Offering advice is the easiest thing to do, something proved all over
again by none less than the President of the United States, Barack
Obama.

In an interview to the Press Trust of India, Mr. Obama noted that India
prohibits foreign investment in too many sectors such as retail and
advised a new “wave” of reforms to attract investors.

“In too many sectors, such as retail, India limits or prohibits the
foreign investment that is necessary to create jobs in both our
countries, and which is necessary for India to continue to grow,” he
said, noting that there was a growing consensus in India for another
wave of economic reforms.

For a domestic audience

Caracas, July 17 :
President Hugo Chavez has a more than 15-point lead on his main rival
ahead of Venezuela's October presidential vote, according to the latest
survey from pollster Datanalisis. Leftist-populist Chavez, 57,
who has been in power since 1999, would get 46.1 percent of votes,
according to a poll conducted from June 14-23, with a sample of 1,300 voters. His opponent, Henrique Capriles, a center-leftist, would get 30.8 percent, the survey, which was released yesterday found.

Monday, July 16, 2012

Russia on Monday laid to rest all speculation that it was distancing
itself from the regime of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad, despite
escalating combat in Syria, which had now spread to several parts of the
capital Damascus.

At a news conference ahead of the visit to Moscow by Kofi Annan, the
United Nations-Arab League envoy to Syria, Russian Foreign Minister
Sergei Lavrov, used exceptionally harsh language to denounce western
powers for deliberately misinterpreting consensus resolutions on Syria
to one-sidedly target the regime. There were “elements of blackmail” in
the western position on Syria, asserted Mr. Lavrov. He stressed that it
was unrealistic to expect that Mr. Assad would step down as “a very
significant part of the Syrian population [was] behind him.”

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Oxford and Birmingham university researchers said older patients were
"largely ignored" after looking at prescribing for nearly 37,000
people.
They found for blood pressure-lowering drugs prescribing
dropped after the age of 85, while for treatment for high cholesterol
the fall started at 75.
But other experts said there could be valid reasons for the findings.
The study, published on the British Medical Journal website,
showed that prescribing of both types of drugs increased every five
years after the ages of 40 to 44.
But by the age of 75 statin use had peaked at 29%, falling to 23% after that.

The presidents of Sudan
and South Sudan have met for the first time since a border dispute
brought their countries close to conflict in April.

Omar al-Bashir sat down with Salva Kiir on the sidelines of an African Union summit in the Ethiopian capital.
South Sudan became independent from the north a year ago, and numerous issues remain unresolved between the two countries.
A United Nations deadline for them to settle the dispute is set for 2 August.

A variety of weapons were used in an attack on the Syrian village of
Treimsa, where more than 150 people were killed this week, with the
homes of rebels and activists bearing the brunt, the U.N. mission said
on Saturday.

“A wide range of weapons were used, including artillery, mortars and
small arms,” the U.N. spokeswoman, Sausan Ghosheh, said in a statement.

“The attack on Treimsa appeared targeted at specific groups and houses,
mainly of army defectors and activists. There were pools of blood and
blood spatters in rooms of several homes together with bullet cases.”